Real Life MMD: Should we keep the wine?

Idiophreak

dinosaur7 wrote: »

I teach Criminal law, and this certainly looks like 'property received by mistake' under the Theft Act 1968. I am not very familiar with the unsolicited goods legislation (Consumer law not Crim!) but I would be very wary of relying on this without checking very carefully first. I have attempted to find the relevant legislation and, although it's not 100% clear, my concern would be that this only applies in situations where the company has knowlingly sent the unsolicited items with a view to obtaining payment - for example the charity Christmas cards that are sometimes sent out at this time of year.
In the case of Tescos, they certainly didn't send the goods in the hope of forcing payment, it was a simple mistake, so I'm not at all sure that this legislation would apply - it's certainly not the situation that the legislation was designed to deal with.
....Of course, if you do take expert advice (try Trading Standards) and conclude that the situation is covered by these regulations and you are entitled to keep the goods.....then, under s2(1)(a) TA 1968, you would not be 'dishonest' (and therefore not commit an offence) because you would have a belief in your legal right to deprive!:) Until then, I would be wary of making the assumption.

Just to make the general point, the topic's about a moral dilemma, not a legal one - I'm fairly sure there's a straight up hard and fast answer to the legal issue - the fun and discussion comes around discussing the morality, which is both somewhat blurrier and (sadly) often somewhat contradictory to law.

fatal1955

You're obviously online, so why phone in the first place? An email would have covered you against charges of "theft" and wouldn't have added to your phone bill.

dinosaur7

Idiophreak wrote: »

Just to make the general point, the topic's about a moral dilemma, not a legal one - I'm fairly sure there's a straight up hard and fast answer to the legal issue - the fun and discussion comes around discussing the morality, which is both somewhat blurrier and (sadly) often somewhat contradictory to law.

OOps...sorry! Good point! :T

shirleyamj

i would send them an email, giving them a reasonable time to collect it if they want to.

geordiejude

As a solicitor, if it was me, I would email them, explain you have already rung and ask them what they want to you to do. I suspect they will thank you for your honesty and let you keep the wine. If you name them, they will get extra publicity worth much more than the wine. Not that I'm cynical..

gorgeousgirlie

I had a similar, lovely experience, although instore.

I'd bought several t-shirts for my son, reduced to £1. When I checked my bill (I always do!) I'd only been charged 50p each.

At first I hesitated but then thought, well if they'd overcharged me I'd have queued up to complain, its only fair I admit I've been undercharged.

I showed the customer services lady and she started getting money out the till as I got my purse out. I explained again I'd been UNDERcharged. 'I know', she said 'but if there's a mistake on your bill we give double the difference back!'

So instead of an uneasy conscience, (which, since you're asking on the forum I assume you have), I walked out the store with free t-shirts and a couple of quid in my pocket - now that's what I call service!!!!

Aynty_Mary

I would write to the customer service department, say you have tried to contact them and ask if they would consider you keeping the wine as a gesture of good will for your honesty.
It would be very poor public relations to refuse.

noodle

gorgeousgirlie wrote: »

I showed the customer services lady and she started getting money out the till as I got my purse out. I explained again I'd been UNDERcharged. 'I know', she said 'but if there's a mistake on your bill we give double the difference back!'

so maybe someone owes the original poster 12 more bottles of plonk!

Bexster

s1lv3rdal5 wrote: »

You should send a letter to the supermarket telling them what has happened, giving them a reasonable time to collect, say 14 days.
If the wine is not collected by then it is yours.
Anything else is THEFT and you could be prosecuted.

What are you basing that opinion on as I take it is a pesonal opinion rather than something you factually substantiated. If the person has taken reasonable steps to inform (in this case) the owner (which they have) then they have not been dishonest in any misappropriation of the property. That is a statutory defence that the person could claim.

mdr86

As my home phone has a loudspeaker setting, and landline (including 0845+0870!) calls are included, I'd just let it ring on loudspeaker while getting on with something stationary (eg. working on computer) until they answer...though it does get a bit irritating after a while...